Milestones: 1801–1829 - Office of the Historian Milestones: 1801–1829 Louisiana Purchase, 1803 The Louisiana Purchase encompassed 530,000,000 acres of territory in North America that the United States purchased from France in 1803 for $15 million. The Louisiana Purchase As the United States spread across the Appalachians, the Mississippi River became an increasingly important conduit for the produce of America’s West (which at that time referred to the land between the Appalachians and the Mississippi). Since 1762, Spain had owned the territory of Louisiana, which included 828,000 square miles. The territory made up all or part of fifteen modern U.S. states between the Mississippi River and the Rocky Mountains. The Pinckney treaty of 1795 had resolved friction between Spain and the United States over the right to navigate the Mississippi and the right for Americans to transfer their goods to ocean-going vessels at New Orleans.

With the Pinckney treaty in place and the weak Spanish empire in control of Louisiana, American statesmen felt comfortable that the United States’ westward expansion would not be restricted in the future. This situation was threatened by Napoleon Bonaparte’s plans to revive the French empire in the New World. He planned to recapture the valuable sugar colony of St. Domingue from a slave rebellion, and then use Louisiana as the granary for his empire. France acquired Louisiana from Spain in 1800 and took possession in 1802, sending a large French army to St. Domingue and preparing to send another to New Orleans. Westerners became very apprehensive about having the more-powerful French in control of New Orleans: President Thomas Jefferson noted , “There is on the globe one single spot, the possessor of which is our natural and habitual enemy. It is New Orleans.” James Monroe In addition to making military preparations for a conflict in the Mississippi Valley, Jefferson sent James Monroe to join Robert Livingston in France to try to purchase New Orleans and West Florida for as much as $10 million. Failing that, they were to attempt to create a military alliance with England. Meanwhile, the French Army in St.

Domingue was being decimated by yellow fever, and war between France and England still threatened. Napoleon decided to give up his plans for Louisiana, and offered a surprised Monroe and Livingston the entire territory of Louisiana for $15 million. Although this far exceeded their instructions from President Jefferson, they agreed. When news of the sale reached the United States, the West was elated. President Jefferson, however, was in a quandary. He had always advocated strict adherence to the letter of the Constitution, yet there was no provision empowering him to purchase territory. Given the public support for the purchase and the obvious value of Louisiana to the future growth of the United States, however, Jefferson decided to ignore the legalistic interpretation of the Constitution and forgo the passage of a Constitutional amendment to validate the purchase. This decision contributed to the principle of implied powers of the federal government. Westward Expansion: The Louisiana Purchase [ushistory.org] 20c. Westward Expansion: The Louisiana Purchase One of the first colored illustrations to be put into print, John H.B. Latrobe's The Balise. Mississippi River captures the haunting image of a navigation station under a full moon at the mouth of the Mississippi River.

Jefferson's plans for the nation depended upon western expansion and access to international markets for American farm products. This vision was threatened, however, when France regained control of Louisiana. Napoleon, who had now risen to power in the French Revolution, threatened to block American access to the important port of New Orleans on the Mississippi River. New American settlements west of the Appalachian Mountains depended upon river transport to get their goods to market since overland trade to the east was expensive and impractical. Blocking American access to New Orleans was such a grave threat to American interests that President Jefferson considered changing his traditional foreign policy stance to an anti-French alliance with the British. At the same time that he sent diplomats to France to bargain for continued trade access along the Mississippi, he also sent diplomats to Britain to pursue other policy options. James Monroe, the top person negotiating in Paris, was empowered to purchase New Orleans and West Florida for between two and ten million dollars. Surprisingly, however, Napoleon offered much more. He was militarily overextended and needing money to continue his war against Britain. Knowing full well that he could not force Americans out of the land France possessed in North America, Napoleon offered all of Louisiana to the U.S. for 15 million dollars.

The massive territory stretched from the Mississippi River to the Rocky Mountains and more than doubled the size of the United States. L. Ducis Napoleon with the King of Rome (Napoleon III) sitting on his lap. The elder Napolean was crowned Emperor of France by Pope Pius VII in 1804. Napoleon's asking price worked out to be about four cents an acre. The deal was struck in April 1803, but it brought a good deal of controversy. While American development in the 19th century depended on western expansion, it also raised controversial issues that might lead to the disunion of the United States. Some New England Federalists, for example, began to talk of seceding from the U.S. since their political power was dramatically reduced by the purchase. Further, Jefferson had clearly not followed his own strict interpretation of the Constitution. Federalist critics howled that the Constitution nowhere permitted the federal government to purchase new land. Jefferson was troubled by the inconsistency, but in the end decided that the Constitution's treaty-making provisions allowed him room to act. Most of the Senate agreed and the Louisiana Purchase easily passed 26 to 6.

The dramatic expansion also contradicted Jefferson's commitment to reduce the national debt as swiftly as possible. Although 15 million dollars was a relatively small sum for such a large amount of land, it was still an enormous price tag for the modest federal budget of the day. Thomas Jefferson's purchase of the Louisiana Territory in 1803 — over 600 million acres at less than 4¢ an acre — was an economic as well as a political victory, as it avoided a possible war with the French. The Louisiana Purchase demonstrates Jefferson's ability to make pragmatic political decisions. Although contrary to some of his central principles, guaranteeing western expansion was so important to Jefferson's overall vision that he took bold action. The gains were dramatic, as the territory acquired would in time add 13 new states to the union. In 1812, Louisiana became the first state to join the union from land bought in the purchase. Louisiana was allowed to enter the United States with its French legal traditions largely in place. Even today, Louisiana's legal code retains many elements that do not follow English common law traditions. The federal system could be remarkably flexible.

Louisiana Purchase, 1803 You are in: Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs > Bureau of Public Affairs > Bureau of Public Affairs: Office of the Historian > Timeline of U.S. Diplomatic History > 1801-1829 Louisiana Purchase, 1803 The Louisiana Purchase refers to the 530,000,000 acres of territory in North America that the United States purchased from France in 1803 for US $15 million. As the United States spread across the Appalachians, the Mississippi River became increasingly important as a conduit for the produce of America's West (which at that time refered to the land between the Appalachians and the Mississippi). Since 1762, Spain had owned the territory of Louisiana, which included 828,000 square miles, and which now makes up all or part of fifteen separate states between the Mississippi River and the Rocky Mountains. Friction between Spain and the United States over the right to navigate the Mississippi and the right for Americans to transfer their goods to ocean-going vessels at New Orleans had been resolved by the Pinckney treaty of 1795.

With the Pinckney treaty in place and the weak Spanish empire in control of Louisiana, American statesmen felt comfortable that the United States' westward expansion would not be restricted in the long run. This situation was threatened by Napoleon Bonaparte's plans to revive the French empire in the New World. He planned to recapture the valuable sugar colony of St. Domingue from a slave rebellion, and then use Louisiana as the granary for his empire. France acquired Louisiana from Spain in 1800 and took possession in 1802, sending a large French army to St. Domingue and preparing to send another to New Orleans. Westerners became very apprehensive about having the more-powerful French in control of New Orleans; President Thomas Jefferson noted, "There is on the globe one single spot, the possessor of which is our natural and habitual enemy. It is New Orleans." In addition to making military preparations for a conflict in the Mississippi Valley, Jefferson sent James Monroe to join Robert Livingston in France to try to purchase New Orleans and West Florida for as much as $10 million. Failing that, they were to attempt to create a military alliance with England. Meanwhile, the French army in St.

Domingue was being decimated by yellow fever, and war between France and England still threatened. Napoleon decided to give up his plans for Louisiana, and offered a suprised Monroe and Livingston the entire territory of Louisiana for $15 million. Although this far exceeded their instructions, they agreed. When news of the sale reached the United States, the West was elated. President Jefferson, however, was in a quandary. He had always advocated strict adherence to the letter of the Constitution, yet there was no provision empowering him to purchase territory. Given the public support for the purchase and the obvious value of Louisiana to the future growth of the United States, however, Jefferson decided to ignore the legalistic interpretation of the Constitution and forgo the passage of a Constitutional amendment to validate the purchase. This decision contributed to the principle of implied powers of the federal government. Louisiana Purchase | Thomas Jefferson's Monticello Thomas Jefferson's Monticello Jefferson and Lewis and Clark Louisiana Purchase The Louisiana Purchase (1803) was a land deal between the United States and France, in which the U.S. acquired approximately 827,000 square miles of land west of the Mississippi River for $15 million.

[T]his little event, of France possessing herself of Louisiana, ... is the embryo of a tornado which will burst on the countries on both shores of the Atlantic and involve in it’s effects their highest destinies. 1 President Thomas Jefferson wrote this prediction in an April 1802 letter to Pierre Samuel du Pont amid reports that Spain would retrocede to France the vast territory of Louisiana. As the United States had expanded westward, navigation of the Mississippi River and access to the port of New Orleans had become critical to American commerce, so this transfer of authority was cause for concern. Within a week of his letter to du Pont, Jefferson wrote U.S. Minister to France Robert Livingston: "every eye in the US. is now fixed on this affair of Louisiana. perhaps nothing since the revolutionary war has produced more uneasy sensations through the body of the nation." 2 Background The presence of Spain was not so provocative. A conflict over navigation of the Mississippi had been resolved in 1795 with a treaty in which Spain recognized the United States' right to use the river and to deposit goods in New Orleans for transfer to oceangoing vessels. In his letter to Livingston, Jefferson wrote, "Spain might have retained [New Orleans] quietly for years.

her pacific dispositions, her feeble state, would induce her to increase our facilities there, so that her possession of the place would be hardly felt by us." He went on to speculate that "it would not perhaps be very long before some circumstance might arise which might make the cession of it to us the price of something of more worth to her." 3 Jefferson's vision of obtaining territory from Spain was altered by the prospect of having the much more powerful France of Napoleon Bonaparte as a next-door neighbor. France had surrendered its North American possessions at the end of the French and Indian War. New Orleans and Louisiana west of the Mississippi were transferred to Spain in 1762, and French territories east of the Mississippi, including Canada, were ceded to Britain the next year. But Napoleon, who took power in 1799, aimed to restore France's presence on the continent. The Louisiana situation reached a crisis point in October 1802 when Spain's King Charles IV signed a decree transferring the territory to France and the Spanish agent in New Orleans, acting on orders from the Spanish court, revoked Americans' access to the port's warehouses. These moves prompted outrage in the United States.

While Jefferson and Secretary of State James Madison worked to resolve the issue through diplomatic channels, some factions in the West and the opposition Federalist Party called for war and advocated secession by the western territories in order to seize control of the lower Mississippi and New Orleans. Negotiations Aware of the need for action more visible than diplomatic maneuvering and concerned with the threat of disunion, Jefferson in January 1803 recommended that James Monroe join Livingston in Paris as minister extraordinary. (Later that same month, Jefferson asked Congress to fund an expedition that would cross the Louisiana territory, regardless of who controlled it, and proceed on to the Pacific. This would become the Lewis and Clark Expedition .) Monroe was a close personal friend and political ally of Jefferson's, but he also owned land in Kentucky and had spoken openly for the rights of the western territories. Jefferson urged Monroe to accept the posting, saying he possessed "the unlimited confidence of the administration & of the Western people." Jefferson added: "all eyes, all hopes, are now fixed on you, ....

for on the event of this mission depends the future destinies of this republic." 4 Shortly thereafter, Jefferson wrote to Kentucky's governor, James Garrard, to inform him of Monroe's appointment and to assure him that Monroe was empowered to enter into "such arrangements as may effectually secure our rights and interest in the Mississipi, and in the country Eastward of that." 5 As Jefferson noted in that letter, Monroe's charge was to obtain land east of the Mississippi. Monroe's instructions, drawn up by Madison and approved by Jefferson, allocated up to $10 million for the purchase of New Orleans and all or part of the Floridas. If this bid failed, Monroe was instructed to try to purchase just New Orleans, or, at the very least, secure U.S. access to the Mississippi and the port. But when Monroe reached Paris on April 12, 1803, he learned from Livingston that a very different offer was on the table. Napoleon's plans to re-establish France in the New World were unraveling.

The French army sent to suppress a rebellion by slaves and free blacks in the sugar-rich colony of Saint Domingue (present-day Haiti) had been decimated by yellow fever, and a new war with Britain seemed inevitable. France's minister of finance, François de Barbé-Marbois, who had always doubted Louisiana's worth, counseled Napoleon that Louisiana would be less valuable without Saint Domingue and, in the event of war, the territory would likely be taken by the British from Canada. France could not afford to send forces to occupy the entire Mississippi Valley, so why not abandon the idea of empire in America and sell the territory to the United States? Napoleon agreed. On April 11, Foreign Minister Charles Maurice de Talleyrand told Livingston that France was willing to sell all of Louisiana. Livingston informed Monroe upon his arrival the next day. Seizing on what Jefferson later called "a fugitive occurrence," Monroe and Livingston immediately entered into negotiations and on April 30 reached an agreement that exceeded their authority — the purchase of the Louisiana territory, including New Orleans, for $15 million. The acquisition of approximately 827,000 square miles would double the size of the United States.

Though rumors of the purchase preceded notification from Monroe and Livingston, their message reached Washington in time for an official announcement on July 4, 1803. The purchase treaty had to be ratified by the end of October, which gave Jefferson and his Cabinet time to deliberate the issues of boundaries and constitutionality. Exact boundaries would have to be negotiated with Spain and England and so would not be set for several years, and Jefferson's Cabinet members argued that the constitutional amendment he proposed was not necessary. As time for ratification of the purchase treaty grew short, Jefferson accepted his Cabinet's counsel and rationalized: "it is the case of a guardian, investing the money of his ward in purchasing an important adjacent territory; & saying to him when of age, I did this for your good." 6 The Senate ratified the treaty on October 20 by a vote of 24 to 7. Spain, upset by the sale but without the military power to block it, formally returned Louisiana to France on November 30. France officially transferred the territory to the Americans on December 20, and the United States took formal possession on December 30.

Jefferson's prediction of a "tornado" that would burst upon the countries on both sides of the Atlantic had been averted, but his belief that the affair of Louisiana would impact upon "their highest destinies" proved prophetic indeed. Louisiana Purchase - Facts & Summary - HISTORY.com Google Louisiana Purchase: Background Beginning in the 17th century, France explored the Mississippi River valley and established scattered settlements in the region. By the middle of the 18th century, France controlled more of the present-day United States than any other European power: from New Orleans northeast to the Great Lakes and northwest to modern-day Montana . In 1762, during the French and Indian War (1754-63), France ceded French Louisiana west of the Mississippi River to Spain and in 1763 transferred nearly all of its remaining North American holdings to Great Britain. Spain, no longer a dominant European power, did little to develop Louisiana during the next three decades. In 1796, Spain allied itself with France, leading Britain to use its powerful navy to cut off Spain from America. Did You Know?

President Thomas Jefferson commissioned the Corps of Discovery Expedition (1804-06), led by Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, to explore the territory acquired in the Louisiana Purchase, among other objectives. In 1801, Spain signed a secret treaty with France to return Louisiana Territory to France. Reports of the retrocession caused considerable uneasiness in the United States. Since the late 1780s, Americans had been moving westward into the Ohio River and Tennessee River valleys, and these settlers were highly dependent on free access to the Mississippi River and the strategic port of New Orleans. U.S. officials feared that France, resurgent under the leadership of Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821), would soon seek to dominate the Mississippi River and access to the Gulf of Mexico . In a letter to U.S.

minister to France Robert Livingston (1746-1813), America’s third president, Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826), stated, “The day that France takes possession of New Orleans…we must marry ourselves to the British fleet and nation.” Livingston was ordered to negotiate with French minister Charles Maurice de Talleyrand (1754-1838) for the purchase of New Orleans Louisiana Purchase: U.S.-France Negotiations France was slow in taking control of Louisiana, but in 1802 Spanish authorities, apparently acting under French orders, revoked a U.S.-Spanish treaty that granted Americans the right to store goods in New Orleans. In response, Jefferson sent future U.S. president James Monroe (1758-1831) to Paris to aid Livingston in the New Orleans purchase talks. In mid-April 1803, shortly before Monroe’s arrival, the French asked a surprised Livingston if the United States was interested in purchasing all of Louisiana Territory.

It is believed that the failure of France to put down a slave revolution in Haiti, the impending war with Great Britain and probable British naval blockade of France, and financial difficulties may all have prompted Napoleon to offer Louisiana for sale to the United States. Negotiations moved swiftly, and at the end of April the U.S. envoys agreed to pay $11,250,000 and assume claims of American citizens against France in the amount of $3,750,000. In exchange, the United States acquired the vast domain of Louisiana Territory, some 828,000 square miles of land. The treaty was dated April 30 and signed on May 2. In October, the U.S. Senate ratified the purchase, and in December 1803 France transferred authority over the region to the United States. Louisiana Purchase: Aftermath The acquisition of the Louisiana Territory for the bargain price of less than three cents an acre was among Jefferson’s most notable achievements as president. American expansion westward into the new lands began immediately, and in 1804 a territorial government was established.

On April 30, 1812, exactly nine years after the Louisiana Purchase agreement was made, the first state to be carved from the territory–Louisiana–was admitted into the Union as the 18th U.S. state. Tags Prologue: Selected Articles | National Archives Prologue: Selected Articles Spring 2003, Vol. 35, No. 1 Jefferson Buys Louisiana Territory, and the Nation Moves Westward By Wayne T. De Cesar and Susan Page The velvet cover of the French exchange copy of the Louisiana Purchase Treaty is embroidered "P.F." for "Peuple Français." (General Records of the United States Government, RG 11) Two centuries ago this spring— without a call to arms, with little advance notice, and with only the briefest negotiations— the United States doubled in size. In an astounding transaction that amounted to four cents an acre, President Thomas Jefferson saw his dreams of westward expansion coming true for the nation he had helped create. The United States of America would grow beyond the Mississippi River and include the rich forests, vast plains, and craggy mountains that would one day yield the vital resources to make it the most powerful and most prosperous nation on earth.

The historic transaction is known as the Louisiana Purchase, but it was not something that Jefferson had sought to make at the time. He would have been content just to buy the port of New Orleans so the United States— not Spain, not France, certainly not Great Britain— could control the gateway to the Mississippi River, the main street of commerce in what was then the American West. But France's ruler at the time, Napoleon Bonaparte, was losing interest in establishing a North American empire and needed funds to fight the British, so he directed his emissaries to offer not just New Orleans but all of the Louisiana Territory to the Americans. Jefferson's envoys in Paris, without awaiting any direction from their President (which would have taken two months), accepted the deal and on April 30, 1803, signed the Louisiana Purchase Treaty. The story of the Louisiana Purchase, however, is more than just a quick deal among the top French and American diplomats in April of 1803. And it took more to complete the Louisiana Purchase than the treaty itself.

It involved more than a year's worth of delicate negotiations to work out the approval of the treaty by Congress, the raising of funds to finance the purchase, and the transfer of documents that completed the deal. There were agreements on how the deal would be financed and various delegations of powers of attorney to individuals carrying out the various functions— some thirty documents in all. Over the years, the Louisiana Purchase Treaty and the two side conventions, which stipulated how France would be compensated for Louisiana, have been part of Department of State records held by the National Archives. They have also been part of NARA's popular " American Originals " exhibit, which is now touring various cities around the country. The treaty shows Napoleon's signature as well as other noted French and American historical figures, such as James Monroe, who later became President, and Talleyrand, Napoleon's foreign minister. Thirty other documents that were needed to implement the Louisiana Purchase also exist, and for many years were kept at the Department of the Treasury. At one point in the 1930s, they were sent to the National Archives for lamination and returned to the Treasury Department.

In 1951 they were accessioned by the National Archives and in 2000 underwent significant conservation work in the NARA Document Conservation Laboratory in College Park, Maryland, in preparation for the bicentennial of the Louisiana Purchase this year. The Original Goal: Buying New Orleans The Louisiana Purchase was as quick in the making as it was historic in its impact. Jefferson's men were in Paris because he wanted to buy the port of New Orleans. To him, New Orleans was key: Whoever owned it would be America's natural enemy because that nation would control the channel through which produce from more than a third of the United States had to pass. Even as he was laying the groundwork for what became the Lewis and Clark Expedition, to explore Louisiana and the western lands, Jefferson gave his ambassador in Paris, Robert Livingston, instructions to negotiate with the French to buy New Orleans. France had ceded Louisiana to Spain in 1762 in the Treaty of Fountainebleau. But in 1800 - 1801, France took it back under the terms of the Treaty of San Ildefonso in 1800 and the Convention of Aranjuez in 1801.

However, at war with England, France kept the retrocession a secret. Napoleon feared that if England knew Louisiana was once again French, it would attack Louisiana with its superior fleet and take possession. He had planned a future colonial empire in North America and the West Indies in which Louisiana would provide raw materials for the sugar islands, an outlet for French goods, and a territory for settlement. Spain, meanwhile, had built fortresses along the eastern edge of the Mississippi, angering western Americans by infringing on what they thought was their natural right of navigation to the sea. To calm the Americans, Spain agreed to the right of Americans to deposit their goods for reshipment at New Orleans in the Treaty of San Lorenzo in 1795. But by 1802, Spain had not lived up to its obligations, twice refusing rights of deposit at New Orleans and not providing another site as stipulated in the 1795 treaty. Western Americans were at a fever pitch and ready to sail down the Mississippi and take New Orleans by force. To avoid a possible armed insurrection and an unpleasant international situation, Jefferson embarked on a plan.

While Spain was solely responsible for the fiasco, France was deemed the actual cause of the insufferable actions. Jefferson now appointed fellow Virginian Monroe as minister plenipotentiary and envoy extraordinary to join Livingston in Paris. Monroe was to work with Livingston on negotiations with France to purchase for ten million dollars the Isle of Orleans, on which New Orleans was located, and "the Floridas," which ran along the coast from present-day Florida to Louisiana and were thought to be French possessions. Napoleon now welcomed negotiations with the Americans. His plans for an empire in America and the West Indies had by this time vanished. A slave revolt and yellow fever ended his plan to subjugate Santo Domingo. Moreover, he feared war with England again and wanted money for the fight. A Surprise Offer and a Time Crunch On April 11, 1803, a day before Monroe arrived in Paris, the French minister of foreign relations, Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Perigord, surprised Livingston by offering the United States not just New Orleans but all of the Louisiana Territory. François Barbé-Marbois, the French minister of the public treasury, discussed the possible sale of Louisiana again with Livingston on April 13.

Although the newly arrived Monroe was less inclined to exceed his instructions, he went along with the idea as an agreement was reached. For four days at the end of April 1803, the Americans and the French worked out an agreement, and on April 30 a treaty was signed. To spell out how the fifteen-million-dollar compensation for Louisiana would be paid, the negotiators also signed two "conventions." The first convention, signed by Livingston, Monroe, and Barbé-Marbois, detailed how the United States would pay the $11,250,000 (sixty million francs) in stock with an interest rate of 6 percent and not redeemable for fifteen years. The second convention detailed how the United States would assume the claims of American citizens against the French navy for seizure of property and goods from American ships at sea. The amount was put at $3,750,000, with 6-percent interest as well, but payments were not to begin until sixty days after the exchange of ratifications, which took place on October 21, 1803.

Jefferson did not learn about the historic deal until July 3, and did not receive the official documents until July 14. There was little opposition at home. The Spanish, however, objected, saying France did not have clear title and had promised never to sell Louisiana to a third party. But Spain's protest did not have French support, and Secretary of State James Madison produced a letter from Spain's foreign minister saying, in effect, that the United States could buy anything it wanted from France as a result of the retrocession. Jefferson also worried about the constitutionality of the acquisition, for the Constitution did not specifically grant the federal government the authority to acquire more territory, and he considered an amendment to the Constitution. But Napoleon was becoming impatient and threatened to void the treaty. Speed was now essential to complete the deal. Jefferson went along with his advisers and dropped the idea of a constitutional amendment and pushed for ratification by the October 30 deadline. The Senate did so on October 20 by a vote of twenty-four to seven. The next day in Washington, the Americans and the French envoy exchanged ratified copies of the treaty.

By November 3, therefore, both houses of Congress had passed legislation authorizing the President to take possession of Louisiana and to create stock for its purchase from France. Many More Documents Implemented the Treaty Now the real work of implementing the treaty and the two conventions began. Because of a possible war with England, French banks would neither buy nor market the American stock. So Livingston and Monroe suggested that two firms, Baring and Company of London and Hope and Company of Amsterdam, conduct the sale of the stock. Hoping the suggestion would be viewed favorably, between May 3 and May 5, 1803, Alexander Baring of Baring and Company was given powers of attorney by both companies for entering into negotiations with France and the United States. On May 28, Barbé-Marbois and the American ministers exchanged correspondence relating to what was now called the American Fund. France approved the suggestion and signed a contract with Baring and Company and Hope and Company for the negotiation of the American Fund, witnessed by Livingston and Monroe, on June 6. On the same day, Barbé-Marbois wrote to Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin that Baring would be arriving in America to begin the transfer of stock.

A letter from the minister of the public treasury of the French Republic to the secretary of the treasury concerning the arrival of Alexander Baring in America. Before treatment (left), the manuscript was distorted, and the upper right corner was missing. After treatment (right), the document is flat and legible. (General Records of the Department of the Treasury, RG 58) In the United States, Baring was granted more detailed powers of attorney by Hope and Company on July 20 and Baring and Company on August 12 as to the American Fund. He was now able to negotiate the number and amounts of certificates to be transferred, to whom the certificates would be made, and the place at which interest would be paid, among other points. The actual fiscal details fell into place, and the $11,250,000 became more than a figure. The challenge, then, was getting the stock to Europe. On December 1, Baring asked Gallatin for the stock to be issued, with receipts ($3,750,000 for Baring and $7,500,000 for Midshipman John B. Nicholson to be delivered to Lt.

James Leonard for delivery to Livingston in Paris; Livingston would give a receipt to Leonard upon receiving the stock). Gallatin wrote a note to Jefferson asking for the date possession was taken of New Orleans so that the register of the Treasury, Joseph Nourse, could fill in the date on the stocks from which interest was to be calculated. Jefferson replied on the bottom of the note that the date was December 20 and sent it back to Gallatin. Gallatin and Baring agreed that the funds would be paid yearly in four installments, and Jefferson approved. A warrant for the preparation of stock certificates for $11,250,000 at 6-percent interest was sent by Gallatin to Nourse, stating that the certificates were not to be issued without further orders from Gallatin. On January 16, 1804, Jefferson sent a warrant to Gallatin to issue the certificates, and the same day Gallatin sent a warrant to Nourse to deliver certificates for $3,750,000 to Baring and another $7,500,000 in certificates to be delivered to Livingston in Paris.

Also on the same day, Baring requested Nourse to transmit two-thirds of the stock (the $7,500,000) to Livingston. Somewhere along the line, plans changed as Gallatin then instructed Nourse to deliver the stock to be sent to Livingston into the hands of Jefferson's private secretary, Lewis Harvie, who would act as messenger and sail from Norfolk. Nourse drafted a letter to the French chargé d'affaires, L. A. Pichon, and Baring, requesting instructions as to the delivery of the stock to Livingston. Pichon wrote to Gallatin the same day agreeing to the transmission arrangements. On February 7, however, Gallatin informed Nourse that they were back to the original plan: The stock was now to be delivered to Midshipman Nicholson to deliver to Lieutenant Leonard, who would sail from New York. The delivery was made and documented on February 13 by a receipt from Leonard to Nicholson. Livingston acknowledged the delivery of the stock to him in Paris by issuing a receipt to Leonard. On April 28, Barbé-Marbois issued a quitclaim to Hope and Company, relinquishing France's claim to the territory.

To complete the transaction, in a letter to Gallatin from Bordeaux, France, Leonard enclosed a duplicate original receipt from Livingston for the stock Leonard delivered to him. Nourse received a letter from Edward Jones, clerk for Gallatin, in which was enclosed the original receipt from Livingston for the stock delivered by Leonard to him in Paris. The Story Just Begins for Historic Documents In December 1803, the Louisiana Territory officially became part of the United States. But the story was not over for the documents of the Louisiana Purchase. It was just beginning. The Louisiana Purchase treaty and the two conventions, both the French and English versions, which were part of the records of the Department of State, were accessioned by the National Archives in 1938. Since then, these documents have been exhibited at the National Archives or loaned to other institutions for exhibition and have undergone minor conservation work— chiefly repairs— from time to time. Over the years, the thirty implementing documents, in the custody of the Treasury Department, survived extensive handling, excessive exhibition, and uncontrolled storage environments before they came to the National Archives in 1951 for good.

But they made at least one visit to the Archives in the 1930s— to be laminated, then a new technique. The National Archives began laminating records (using hydraulic presses to apply cellulose acetate film) in 1936, and the Louisiana Purchase records, treated in the late 1930s, were among the earliest records to be laminated. The last lamination press was removed in the late 1980s, and documents are no longer treated by cellulose acetate lamination. At the time of its dominant use, however, cellulose acetate lamination was a state-of-the-art preservation technique, used to protect precious and inherently valuable historic documents— providing a means of supporting and holding together fragile or fragmented paper. Because it is generally soluble in acetone, cellulose acetate lamination can be a reversible process if materials on the laminated document are not affected by the acetone. The thirty laminated Louisiana Purchase documents represented a wide range of types and conditions. Some documents were very simple as physical objects, such as a single sheet of cream colored paper written in brown iron gall ink on both sides.

Others were more complex: for example, a large piece of watermarked antique laid paper with hand stamps, resin seals and important signatures. Some were distorted, yellowed, and embrittled. Others, however, appeared to be in good condition; they were flat, supple and written on paper that was no more significantly darkened than similar but unlaminated paper two hundred years old. While it is impossible to know how each document was treated over the years, some plausible explanations for their varying conditions exist. They may have been laminated using excessive heat and pressure, the cellulose acetate may have contained unstable plasticizers, or they may have been overexposed to light during long-term exhibition at the Treasury Department. Resin seals on some documents remain intact, while others have been crushed, which indicates that some documents were carefully laminated by hand to protect vulnerable resin seals, hand stamps and presidential signatures that they bore, while others were not. In most cases, cellulose acetate lamination is reversible in acetone, a common organic solvent. It generally does not harm the paper, inks, hand stamps, or seals, though careful testing prior to any treatment is necessary to verify the safety of the solvents needed for delamination.

Cellulose acetate lamination fell from favor and was replaced by polyester encapsulation, introduced in 1976 at the Library of Congress and at the National Archives in the early 1980s. Encapsulation involves placing a document between two sheets of polyester film, all of whose edges are sealed except for air holes at the corners; encapsulated records can be easily removed from their protective enclosures by cutting off the sealed edges of the polyester envelope. Delaminating Documents Required Tests, Careful Procedures The delamination of the Louisiana Purchase implementing documents at the Archives did not begin until a half-century after they were accessioned from the Treasury Department in 1951. In 2000, a condition report and treatment proposal for the records described each document and its physical appearance: type of paper, media, any special features such as seals, stamps, and notations. Each document's condition was also assessed and described, including location of major and minor tears, breaks or losses, presence of stains, areas of discoloration, as well as the location of any previous repairs. Three documents were chosen for initial conservation treatment to represent a specific conservation issue or problem of varying complexity.

Results of the tests would help determine the treatment for other documents. The three documents were: "Letter from the Minister of the Public Treasury of the French Republic to the Secretary concerning the arrival of Alexander Baring in America and the plans for carrying out the terms of the agreement" (original in French). This is a double-sided single page document of cream colored antique laid paper bearing the Dutch "Cobb & Co" watermark and written in iron gall ink. Like many other Louisiana Purchase documents, it had a strip of cotton gauze adhered to its left edge, with gauze strips that were sewn together and bound into a book. There were some smudges and tears, but the paper was in generally good condition. "Convention between the French Republic and the United States." This document was selected to represent records that had been on permanent exhibit. This item, pages 1 and 2, also represented a higher degree of challenge because the document, written on strong antique laid paper, had become very badly distorted during exhibition and it was at first unclear whether these planar distortions could be reduced or eliminated during treatment. Tape had been applied to the verso to hold the record in position in its window mat during exhibition.

In addition, the ink on the document had previously bled as a result of contact with water. "Power of attorney given to Alexander Baring by Hope and Company to act in American matters relating to the negotiations of the American fund" (July 20, 1803). This document in the pilot project was selected for treatment because it, like several others, had a fragile red resin seal. The seal was attached to the verso near signatures and hand stamps in black ink. This document represented the highest degree of conservation challenge in the pilot project. Before any conservation treatment began, testing was done to determine whether the inks were soluble in the solvent selected for delamination. Fortunately, each document had a wide left border of cellulose acetate that extended beyond the paper itself, to allow it to be bound into a volume. A long strip of cotton gauze had been attached to the left edge of the paper document before it was laminated. This non-record salvage strip was removed and used to test the solubility of the cellulose acetate. After several attempts to dissolve the lamination in acetone, the conservator tried a mixture of acetone and water; the lamination quickly dissolved.

The delaminated cotton gauze was removed from the beaker, dried, and examined. After delamination, the previously yellowed appearance was gone. The gauze appeared white, clean and, when the solvents and water had completely evaporated, the fabric was flat. Next, all inks, seals, hand stamps, and all other media were tested for solubility with the acetone and water mixture to determine that all materials were safe and would not bleed when immersed in the mixture during delamination. The treatment proceeded following a step-by-step protocol. Each document was immersed in a tray containing acetone and water until all the cellulose acetate had been removed. This delamination process usually required several baths, sometimes as many as seven immersions. Next, the documents were bathed in a mixture of ethyl alcohol and water containing calcium. Calcium has been shown to stabilize both the iron gall ink and paper. Adding alcohol to the water reduces the risk of solubilizing the ink present. After bathing in water and ethyl alcohol, the documents were briefly immersed in calcium-enriched water alone.

Following bathing, the paper was dried between blotters with special protection and cushioning to protect seals and paper wafers during drying. Tears, losses, and fragile or vulnerable areas behind the seals or thick areas of highly acidic and corrosive iron gall ink were mended and reinforced with Japanese handmade paper adhered with wheat starch paste. Senior conservator Susan Page at work at the microscope, consolidating a fragile resin seal. (Photo by Richard Schneider, NARA) Some of the seals had been crushed during lamination and were consolidated with an adhesive applied with a very fine brush, with work being conducted under high magnification using a binocular microscope. Each document was encapsulated in a strong, stable transparent polyester film. Upon initial examination, many of the Louisiana Purchase documents appeared to be in relatively poor condition. But after delamination, the documents were brighter in appearance, the ink contrast was greatly enhanced, and the integrity of the paper had been preserved. All thirty of the implementing documents were delaminated by October 2000. In 2002, three blank stock certificates, which were used to raise funds for the purchase, were discovered among the records of the Bureau of the Public Debt, a Treasury Department agency.

They are awaiting minor preservation treatment but will require only humidification, flattening, and very minor mending. Following conservation treatment, several of these implementing documents were placed on short-term exhibit under low light levels as part of the National Archives' "American Originals" exhibition, which has also featured the treaty and the conventions. The National Archives has also loaned some of the documents to exhibit during Louisiana Purchase bicentennial observances (see accompanying list ). An Unusual Ceremony Provides a Historic Moment The Louisiana Purchase is considered one of the great chapters in American history— when Jefferson's men seized the moment and, in a single action, changed America and its place in the world. On December 20, 1803, in an unusual ceremony in New Orleans, the flag of Spain was lowered, the flag of France was raised and then lowered, and the flag of the United States was raised, signifying the two changes in ownership of Louisiana— 828,000 square miles often called the greatest real estate deal in history. With the purchase of Louisiana, Thomas Jefferson's long-held dream of westward expansion took a giant leap. His plan to explore it and discover its riches and possibilities was already under way.

Meriwether Lewis and William Clark would write the next chapter. Wayne T. De Cesar is a reference archivist with the National Archives and Records Administration, Textual Services Division, where he works with the Treasury/Revenue/Finance cluster of Federal records. He joined NARA in 1989 as a member of the Records Declassification Division, and a few years later worked for a year with the Nixon Presidential Materials Staff. Susan Page is a senior paper conservator and member of the Document Conservation Branch. She joined the NARA staff in 1987 after working at the Library of Congress since 1979. Articles published in Prologue do not necessarily represent the views of NARA or of any other agency of the United States Government. This page was last reviewed on August 15, 2016. History: Louisiana Purchase Louisiana Purchase With the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, the United States acquired a large area of land from the French . It was the single largest purchase of land ever by the United States and doubled the size of the country. Why did the United States want more land? The United States had been growing rapidly.

In search of new land to plant crops and raise livestock, people had been expanding to the west past the Appalachian Mountains and into the Northwest Territory. As these lands became crowded, people needed more land and the obvious place to expand was to the west. How much did it cost? Thomas Jefferson wanted to buy the settlement of New Orleans from the French. It was a major seaport that was fed from the Mississippi River, making it important to many American businesses. He sent Robert Livingston, the U.S. Minister to France, to try and buy the land from the French Emperor Napoleon . At first Napoleon refused to sell. He had hopes of creating a massive empire that included the Americas. However, soon Napoleon began to have troubles in Europe and he needed money desperately. James Monroe traveled to France to work with Robert Livingston. In 1803, Napoleon offered to sell the entire Louisiana Territory to the United States for $15 million. United States Expansion Map from the National Atlas of the United States. The Louisiana Purchase is shown in green (Click picture to see larger view) How big was it? The Louisiana Purchase was huge.

It totaled 828,000 square miles and all or part of what would later become 15 different states. It doubled the size of the United States and made it a major world nation. Borders The Louisiana Purchase stretched from the Mississippi River in the east to the Rocky Mountains in the west. Its southernmost tip was the port city of New Orleans and the Gulf of Mexico. To the North it included much of Minnesota, North Dakota, and Montana up to the border of Canada. Opposition At the time, many leaders in the United States were against the Louisiana Purchase. They thought that Thomas Jefferson didn't have the right to make such a large purchase of land and that we would soon be at war with Spain over the land. The purchase was nearly cancelled by Congress and only passed by the vote of 59-57. Exploration President Jefferson organized expeditions to explore the new land. The most famous expedition was that of Lewis and Clark . They traveled up the Missouri River and eventually went all the way to the Pacific Ocean. Another expedition was the Pike Expedition led by Zebulon Pike which explored the Great Plains and into Colorado where they discovered Pike's Peak. There was also the Red River Expedition which explored the Southwest.

Interesting Facts about the Louisiana Purchase The Louisiana Purchase would have cost $233 million in 2011 dollars. That's around 42 cents per acre. Some historians claim that Napoleon had no right to sell the Louisiana Territory to the United States. The issue of slavery in the western lands of the Louisiana Purchase became a major issue in later years and part of the cause of the American Civil War. The land had been owned by Spain for a while before they sold it back to France in 1800. Napoleon didn't mind selling the land to the United States because he thought it would hurt his enemy England. The original price of $15 million worked out to around 3 cents an acre. Activities Louisiana Purchase, 1803 (Primary Documents of American History: The American Revolution and the New Nation, 1775-1815) | Web Guides, Library of Congress A Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation This collection contains congressional publications from 1774 to 1875, including debates, bills, laws, and journals.

The Louisiana Purchase: Legislative Timeline 1802-1807 - This timeline explores the role of Congress in the Louisiana Purchase from 1802 to 1807, including ratification of the treaty, establishment of a territorial government, confrontation with Spain over boundary issues, and its limited role in the Lewis and Clark Expedition. An American Time Capsule: Three Centuries of Broadsides and Other Printed Ephemera The Printed Ephemera collection comprises 28,000 primary-source items dating from the seventeenth century to the present and encompasses key events and eras in American history. Louisiana: European Explorations and the Louisiana Purchase This collection focuses on the various documents—from maps to newspapers to cultural artifacts—that help to describe the region of North America that stretched from as far east as Alabama into what is now the state of Montana. The 119 items presented here come from the various special and general collections of the Library of Congress.

Maps The Library of Congress has custody of the largest and most comprehensive cartographic collection in the world with collections numbering over 5.5 million maps, 80,000 atlases, 6,000 reference works, over 500 globes and globe gores, 3,000 raised relief models, and a large number of cartographic materials in other formats, including over 19,000 cds/dvds. The online map collections represents only a small fraction that have been converted to digital form. Louisiana . This map of Louisiana was published in the 1804 edition of the Arrowsmith & Lewis New and Elegant General Atlas. Search this collection to locate additional maps related to the Louisiana Purchase and the Lewis and Clark Expedition. The Thomas Jefferson Papers at the Library of Congress The complete Thomas Jefferson Papers from the Manuscript Division at the Library of Congress consists of approximately 27,000 documents. Thomas Jefferson, October 17, 1803, Annual Message . Jefferson's Annual Message to Congress discussed in great detail the recent purchase of Louisiana from the French.

[ Transcription ] Result Effectively Doubled The Size of The United States Louisiana Purchase summary: The United States bought 828,000 square miles of land from France in 1803. The French controlled this region from 1699 until 1762 when it became Spanish property because France gave it to Spain as a present, since they were allies. But under Napoleon Bonaparte, France revived the aspirations to build an empire in North America so the territory was taken back in 1800. However, those big plans were not meant to be because Napoleon needed to concentrate on preparations for war with the British Empire and so the land was sold to the United States. The price was 15 million dollars. The purchased territory included the whole of today’s Arkansas, Iowa, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, and Nebraska, parts of Minnesota and Louisiana west of Mississippi River, including New Orleans, big parts of North and northeastern New Mexico, South Dakota, northern Texas, some parts of Wyoming, Montana, and Colorado as well as portions of Canadian provinces Alberta and Saskatchewan. Read More in Wild West Magazine Subscribe online and save nearly 40%!!! Thomas Jefferson was the American president at the time of the Louisiana Purchase.

The United States initially wanted to buy only New Orleans and the land around it. The purchase met with the strong opposition in the States on account of being unconstitutional. Those accusations were accurate, at least to some extent. President Jefferson couldn’t deny that the Constitution of the United States did not provide for acquiring new territories but still he decided to proceed with the purchase since the removal of French presence in the region was such an important issue. Louisiana Purchase Map

Question: Which American President organised the Louisiana Purchase in 1803?
Answer: THOMAS JEFFERSON